Ping-pong balls and Wintertime

Sometimes you just feel like a ping-pong ball. I feel like a ping-pong ball a lot these days. Audrey is getting molars and she is grumpy and starting to get bossy! Every so often she'll have a good day and return to my happy, sweet child. But a lot of most of the times she's quite insistent on doing everything her way, or else! She is learning to communicate what she wants better which is really cool... sometimes... but she is definitely an opinionated child. I look forward to her teenaged years with much trepidation...

She loves the coat closet.

Thomas is insane with busy-ness and business. School has been nuts for him, getting projects and papers and various things done, running here and there at all hours of the day and night (usually night). Work at Allstate has been pretty busy as of late, which is great because it means more $$$ for us in the end. MissionShoe is busy getting things ready for another shipment of shoes to come into Salt Lake the next week or so. I'm trying to keep up with all of this and get him out the door on time to everywhere he needs to be. So excited for Christmas... but first Thanksgiving! Definitely looking forward to that break. If it's really a break. At our house weekends somehow manage to be more stressful than weekdays... last weekend was GREAT because it wasn't. Fingers crossed for this weekend... and for Thanksgiving break. I'm really hoping it doesn't turn into Busy Central and we can have some much needed family downtime! But it really is a blessing to be so busy. I really can't complain!

In other news, Audrey is still cute. Guess that's not really news- she just keeps getting cuter though. Blows my mind. She is learning how to fold her arms when we pray. She also is learning how to come DOWN stairs. Up is really easy, but down is of course trickier. She is seriously obsessed with stairs- anyplace we go on that has stairs she has to go up and down them as many times as possible. She is learning to make the kissing sound- which is a lot less slobbery than the open-mouthed variety she practiced before. She is also learning how to play nicer with other kids- to share and to "be soft". Every time I tell her "be soft" she's taken to petting her own head. I guess I must have done that to her to show her what it means to be soft, and she does it to herself now. So CUTE. She loves loves LOVES to dance to anything that resembles a beat- from Daddy's typing on the keyboard to Mommy stirring something to "Called To Serve" during Sunday School, she will dance exuberantly.

I am doing pretty good- I really have been loving to recipe blog-hop and try new things out for dinner lately. I love cooking/baking... when my kitchen is clean... which is challenging because Audrey really doesn't care for me being in the kitchen when she isn't eating something in her high chair. She whines and cries and tries to push me away from the counters. Really her favorite place for me to be is sitting on the floor, doing nothing very important or attention-consuming. She likes me to be available just in case she wants to play with me or needs me. I'm like the toy that she doesn't want anyone else to play with- just for her to play with. And when she's not playing with me, I should just sit there and wait for her to be ready to play again! Sometimes she is nice to me- and in the mornings when she wakes up too early and I'm so tired because she wakes me up many times during the night due to aforementioned molars... she lets me doze while she tears up the house. So nice of her, really- I'd take the trade any day for a much-needed nap. Anyway, other than being Audrey's favorite toy, we've been enjoying the nice weather the past week or so and played outside a bunch! I even raked some leaves (before the super windy day blew them around again) and stacked some wood... Audrey LOVES being outside. It will be a hard winter for her inside.

I'd like to say this happened while I was napping... but I'm pretty sure I had just walked in the other room to grab something really quick.

Helping Daddy stack our wood!

She loves carrying sticks around. Whenever we go outside she has to find one and will carry it with her until we have to go inside and I take it from her.

My callings are changing again... again with the ping-pong business... more on this later. I've taken to organizing things lately (closets, toys, etc) which is fun, but really I'm just avoiding the pile of papers sitting and waiting for me to sort and find a place for and put away. I'm not sure why I am dreading doing it- I usually don't mind sorting papers like that. Oh well. Someday. Most days I do good to follow the Tornado around and pick up things left in her wake.

Halloween was fun- the only real thing we did was go to our ward Halloween Chili party and Carnival the Wednesday before Halloween. Audrey went as a pirate lass and Thomas dressed as a fat person. It was fun- Audrey loved running around and eating cornbread (she didn't like the chili) and dancing to the music at the musical chairs game. Halloween night we stayed in and ate pizza, candy, and watched Nacho Libre before Audrey went to sleep, and after Thomas and I watched The Raven- quirky old movie with Boris Karloff, Vincent Price and Peter Lorre. It was a fun movie- nothing really like Poe's poem though. We had a good night, even if Audrey didn't observe the end of Daylight Savings Time by letting us sleep in an extra hour the next morning.

Thomas and Sam Goff. Those fatties. ;)

Our sweet little pirate lass! She wouldn't keep her hair scarf on for anything. But it was pretty darn cute for about a second and a half before we left the house.

We are gearing up for the winter- it snowed tonight and I'm pretty sure our nice, play-outside weather is at an end. I felt like we got really lucky to have play-outside weather in October/November. Shout out to our poor AZ family who has had to endure insanely hot "fall" temperatures... but now you guys get the good weather while we huddle under blankets by the fire to keep our feet from freezing. And you don't have to worry about driving on the ice. :( I really don't mind that it's winter, or the snow, except that I'm really not looking forward to having a teething toddler cooped up inside for 8 months. Thank goodness for a brown Christmas in AZ!!!! Which we are super excited for!!! *cheers*

Snow from early-mid October sometime

Tonight's snowfall- a hurried picture because the child was screaming at me for leaving her for 5 seconds

Our toasty warm fire by which to warm our feet (and our house)

Thomas took this one morning- it's a picture of the ice on the top of my car.

Well I'm going to go eat some Corn Nuts and just veg for a bit before heading off to bed. Love to all!